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James

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James Surname Genealogy

The surname James comes from the
personal name which has the same origin as Jacob (the Latin
Jacobus). Jacobus and James appeared interchangeable in 13th
century records.

However, James developed as a separate name in its own right, largely
because in the authorized version of the Bible the form James was used
in the New Testament as the name of two of Christ’s apostles (James the
brother of John and James the brother of Andrew), whereas in the Old
Testament the brother of Esau was called Jacob.

There were James in Pembrokeshire by the 17th century, including early
emigrants to America.William James,
born there in 1720, ran away to sea as a young man and made his name
with the
British navy in India.He returned to
England wealthy and a Baronet.John
James, a farmer at Trenewydd in the same county, kept a diary of his
year in
1846 which has been preserved.

Christopher James was a provision
merchant in Swansea in the early 19th century and Mayor of the town in
1849.His son William became a Judge on
the High
Court.In 1856 Evan James, the son of a
woollen manufacturer in Caerphilly, composed Land of My Fathers,
what
was to become the Welsh national anthem.

The James family
of Grosmont in
Monmouthshire, near the English border, dates back to the 17th century.They owned the Town Farm there until the
retirement of John James in 1845.Another old Monmouthshire family stemmed from Lewis James,
curate of
Bedwellty from 1633 to 1667.

England. The
name William James was documented in Wiltshire as early as 1300.And James was to be found in English counties
in
proximity
to Wales, such as Cornwall.John and
Mary James were married there at St. Hilary in 1679.Another family history began with the
marriage of William James and Elizabeth Harvey in Breage in 1762.

The name also
existed elsewhere:

James
at Newport on
the Isle of Wight dated back to the late 15th century.Thomas James and his nephew Richard were
notable scholars in the early 17th century.

Christopher
and Ellen James lived at Gnosall in Staffordshire in the
late 1500’s.

while one family history in the northeast began with the
birth
of Thomas
James in 1638 in Hebron, Northumberland.He was the first James of a line of Parish Clerks which
continued until
1888.

Ireland.The
James name is in
Ireland, mainly because of English or Welsh arrivals there.A James from Worcestershire who fought at the
Battle of the Boyne later moved south to Wicklow and Carlow.There was a James line at Carnew in Wicklow by
the 1730’s.Some later emigrated to
Canada.

The first James ito arrive was probably John James,
a Welshman from Carnarvon who came to Virginia
around
1650. His descendants became Baptists and settled in
Kentucky.
Later descendants were the outlaws Jesse James and his brother
Frank James. They
made their money
robbing banks.Their uncle Drury W.
James had come to California during the Gold Rush and made his fortune
as a
cattle rancher.

A
James family of Welsh Baptists from Pembrokeshire came to
Pennsylvania
in 1711
and settled in Montgomery county, where they helped to organize a
Baptist
church.

Scots Irish. William James
arrived
in New York in 1789 from a farming family in Baillieborough in county
Cavan.He made his fortune in real
estate.His son Henry was a prominent
American
theologian of his day; and Henry’s offspring included the philosopher
William James
and the writer Henry James.

Caribbean.
Richard James from Wales was an officer in the expedition to Jamaica in
1655 who stayed.His son Richard, born
in 1656, was a colonel in the local militia who lived to be 103.In his latter years he was said to have lived
almost entirely on cocoa.These James
made their home in Hanover parish.Jonathan James was a plantation owner in St. Elizabeth parish in
the
mid-1700’s.

Canada.In 1869 newly
widowed Agnes James left her home in St. Gorran, Cornwall for Liverpool
where
she departed with her seven children on the Austrianfor
Canada. Arriving in Quebec, the family made their way
to Mara township in south central Ontario.The James numbers grew in Canada and they held a family reunion
in 1937.

William James arrived in Toronto from the
English Midlands with his family in 1906.He was a photographer by trade and many of his photographs of
Toronto
have survived.

“One of the last major events he covered was the
1939 Royal Tour.This netted one of his
favorite photographs: a shot of George VI and Queen Elizabeth standing
on the
steps of Toronto's City Hall."

Select
James Miscellany

If you would like to read more, click on the miscellany page for
further stories and accounts:

Jesse James was a
legendary outlaw of the old West.Henry James was an
American-born writer in England during Victorian times of novels such
as The Portrait of a Lady.
His brother was the philosopher William James.Alex James was a Scottish
footballer, one of the Wembley wizards who thrashed England in 1928.Elmore James was a blues
guitarist from Mississippi, known as "the king of the slide guitar."C.L.R James was the
Trinidad-born writer and journalist, best known for his cricketing
book, Beyond A Boundary. P.D James is a popular English
crime writer.Select James Today